


Candidly

by hazelNuts



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types
Genre: Canon Universe, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Getting Together, POV Isabelle, Sort Of, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-11
Updated: 2018-02-11
Packaged: 2019-03-16 13:12:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13636959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hazelNuts/pseuds/hazelNuts
Summary: Isabelle tries to figure out how to get Clary to start drawing again. She decides to take the least direct approach.Isabelle hadn’t meant to take things this far. All she wanted was to see more of Clary’s art, but since Clary hasn’t picked up a pencil in months and it’s become a bit of a sore subject for her, Isabelle had to get a little creative. She knew Clary posted some of her work online, she just didn’t know where. Getting that info from Simon took almost no effort.





	Candidly

**Author's Note:**

> If you think I forgot any tags, please let me know in the comments.

Isabelle hadn’t meant to take things this far. All she wanted was to see more of Clary’s art, but since Clary hasn’t picked up a pencil in months and it’s become a bit of a sore subject for her, Isabelle had to get a little creative. She knew Clary posted some of her work online, she just didn’t know where. Getting that info from Simon took almost no effort. Clary has her earliest work on DeviantArt, a couple pictures of half-finished drawings on Instagram, but most of it’s on Tumblr. Simon even told her Clary’s usernames without any prodding from her.

The second Isabelle got back to her room and her laptop, she’d looked up all of Clary’s profiles. She knew Clary could draw, but this is something else. She spends several hours admiring the drawings and paintings of both the magical and the mundane, of terrifying demons and simple landscapes. A lot of the pieces have partial runes in them, and it makes Isabelle smile. She traces the faint outline of the fire rune in the sky above a water demon. Even when Clary didn’t know it, she was already part of this world, her angel blood singing to her through the walls Jocelyn had built in an attempt to protect her. And then this world took everything from Clary: her home, her mother, her art.

Isabelle sighs and frowns at her screen. Even with her untrained eye, she can see the love and joy in Clary’s drawings, despite their often dark subjects. She wants Clary to have that back. She wants Clary to see the beauty in the world again. She needs Clary to remember that the world isn’t made of ichor and death.

After a moments deliberation, Isabelle has made her decision. It doesn’t take her long to figure out how the site works and then she has her own blog. The first thing she does is reblog every piece of Clary’s art, leaving compliments in the tags. It doesn’t feel like enough, too impersonal. She goes back and forth between sending an ask or using the messenger. Finally she chooses the ask. The messenger might be a little too personal; and she doesn’t want Clary to find out it’s her, since Clary doesn’t exactly appreciate her bringing up her art in real life. Sometimes a compliment or encouragement is easier to accept from a stranger than from a friend.

She keeps the message simple, telling Clary she loves her art and she’s excited to see more of her work in the future. Before she can change her mind, she sends the message. She logs off and closes her laptop, nerves jittering happily.

A knock on her door makes her jump.

‘You coming with us for dinner at the Jade Wolf?’ Clary asks.

Isabelle turns to her with a flush of guilt and a smile that is probably just a little too wide. ‘Who is we?’

‘Me, Simon, and Maia,’ Clary explains. ‘Alec and Jace are on duty.’

‘Just give a me second to find some shoes,’ Isabelle says.

Clary nods and sits down on Isabelle’s bed to wait. They talk about the movies Clary is planning on showing her the next time they both have a night off until Isabelle finds the shoes she’s looking for. With a final conspiratorial glance at her laptop, Isabelle closes the door behind her.

She knows she shouldn’t expect an answer to her message soon, or at all really, but she still checks her inbox a couple times over the next week. When she’s greeted by the little “1” by the envelope, she clicks on it with her heart pounding. It could just be spam. Or some random person she doesn’t care about.

It’s not from a random person. It’s an answer from Clary: _Thank you so much for your sweet message! (and all those lovely tags you left on my posts) Things got a little crazy in my personal life, so I haven’t really been drawing lately. I do miss it a little._

Isabelle’s heart aches. She knew Clary hadn’t been drawing much lately, but this sounds as if Clary isn’t drawing at all. She doesn’t hesitate to send Clary another message: _I hope you find the inspiration to start again soon._

Smiling proudly at her reflection in the screen, Isabelle closes the window.

~

Things get hectic at the Institute when there’s a mass outbreak from the demon dimension. It’s all hands on deck, and Isabelle barely has time to sleep between her duties in the field and in the lab, and no room in her head aside from paperwork, meetings, and test results. She completely forgets about the message she sent Clary.

When the demon activity finally slows down and people are getting time off again, Isabelle finds herself in the greenhouse on her first free afternoon in almost three weeks. It’s quiet in here, and she feels like she can breathe again. She lies down on one of the benches, propping her jacket under her head, one leg dangling off the seat, heel lightly scraping the floor as she swings her leg. She breathes in deeply, smiling as the smells of the flowers and greens fills her lungs, banishing the smells of car exhaust and demon ichor.

 _Maybe I should’ve picked botany instead of forensics_ , she thinks to herself. Then remembers that botany also involves lots of dirt and the smell of manure. She infinitely prefers her clean lab.

She’s so lost in her thoughts that it takes a while for her to realize she’s not alone. The sound of faint scratches intrude upon her thoughts. She opens her eyes, squinting at the sun shining through the glass roof before turning her head to the source of the scratching. Clary is sitting a couple feet away, her sketchpad on her lap. There’s a small frown between her brows from concentration, but she looks more relaxed, more like herself, than Isabelle’s seen her in a long time. Before Clary can catch her staring, Isabelle looks up and closes her eyes again. She stays like that until the scratching of pencil on paper stops. She doesn’t get up until she’s tracked Clary’s fading footsteps all the way out of the greenhouse.

To Isabelle’s relief, it’s not the last time she catches sight of Clary and her sketchpad. She doesn’t talk to Clary about it, simply leaves her be, pretending that seeing Clary drawing again doesn’t warm something inside of her. She can’t guess at the subject of the drawings, but even if it’s just the brick walls of the Institute, if it’s making Clary look so relaxed and happy, Isabelle would have her drawing walls for the rest of her life.

It’s not until Clary walks into the lab, jumps up on an empty table, and starts drawing, that Isabelle thinks it might be safe to say something about it.

‘That’s not proper lab dress,’ she says, pointing at Clary’s jeans and hoodie.

‘If you have a spare lab coat, I’ll be happy to wear it,’ Clary says, throwing Isabelle a cheeky grin. She lays down her paper and pencil, and holds out her arms.

Isabelle smiles and shakes her head. She grabs one of the spare lab coats out of the closet, and helps Clary into it. When Clary’s all buttoned up, Isabelle goes back to her station. She can sense the curiosity from the other people working in the lab, but she ignores them. All she cares about is the soft scratching of Clary’s pencil on the paper. She tries to focus on her own work, but her curiosity grows to big for her to ignore. When it finally becomes unbearable, she turns around to face Clary.

‘Can I ask you something?’ she asks.

‘Sure.’ Clary barely glances up from her drawing.

‘What made you start drawing again?’

‘I found my inspiration,’ Clary says. She finally looks up. Her eyes have a look in them that makes Isabelle’s heart beat a little faster. She’s used to people looking at her like she’s beautiful, the flush of cheeks and the slightly parted lips, but that’s not how Clary is looking at her. Clary’s gaze is steady and open, an almost imperceptible smile on her lips. Clary is looking at her like she could look at her forever, smudged make up, messy lab-hair, and shapeless lab coat included.

‘And what would that be?’ Isabelle asks, catching Clary’s eyes with her own.

Clary’s smile widens as she hands Isabelle her sketchpad. Isabelle blinks at it for a second, not expecting this huge token of trust, then she carefully take the sketchpad. It’s still open to the drawing Clary was just working on. It takes her a minute to figure out, but then she realizes that it’s a drawing of _her,_ bent over her work. She looks up at Clary in confusion. Clary’s gaze has shifted to nervous, and she’s biting her lip. Isabelle turns the page. It’s another one of her. She can’t tell when this was, but she thinks it’s from a briefing—she’s standing over one of the consoles and there are vague outlines of other people, but she’s the only one fully drawn. She turns the page and finds a drawing of herself sitting on the floor of the training room. Page after page she finds drawings of herself. The first drawing is one of her lying on the bench in the greenhouse. She reaches out to trace the lines of her leg that she can almost see swinging, but quickly pulls her hand back, not wanting to smudge the drawing.

‘I’m your inspiration?’ she asks, awe in her voice.

Clary nods. ‘It’s probably not exactly what you meant.’

‘What I– _Oh_.’ Isabelle presses her lips together, trying to hide her guilty smile. Then she shakes her head and chuckles. ‘I probably wasn’t very subtle when I chose “shadowangel” as a username.’

‘Not really,’ Clary laughs. ‘But you actually forgot to log out. Remember when I used your computer a couple weeks back?’

Isabelle huffs and rolls her eyes at herself. ‘Rooky mistake.’

‘You don’t mind, though, do you?’ Clary asks. She nods at the sketchpad. ‘I’ll stop if it bothers you.’

‘Don’t,’ Isabelle quickly says, shaking her head. She hands Clary back her drawings. ‘And you really don’t have be sneaky about it.’

‘I don’t think this counts as sneaky.’ Clary gestures at the table she’s sitting on and the lab coat Isabelle put on her.

‘I mean’—Isabelle rolls her chair close enough to put her hands on Clary’s knees—'that you can just ask me to pose for you. Or…’ She takes a deep, fortifying breath. ‘Or you can draw me later tonight, in the greenhouse, after we’ve had a picnic?’

‘Or, I can draw you later tonight,’ Clary begins, leaning in, smirk tugging at the corner of her mouth, ‘not in the greenhouse, but in your be–‘

‘Ahem.’

Both girls jerk their head towards the door.

‘Whatever is happening here, don’t let it interfere with your work,’ Alec says from the doorway. ‘Izzy, are you done analysing the samples from the ichor of those chimera demons?’

Isabelle rolls herself back to her station with a pout. ‘Almost,’ she says.

Alec gives her a sharp nod before leaving, but Isabelle doesn’t miss the pleased smile tugging at the corner of her brother’s mouth.

‘We’ll work out the details later,’ Isabelle tells Clary before peering through the microscope again.

‘Can I stay here until you’re done?’ Clary asks.

‘Of course,’ Isabelle says.

The scratching of Clary’s pencil is no longer a distraction. It’s a motivation, that soon becomes a comfortable background noise, one that Isabelle hopes to hear frequently and for a long time.

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi on [tumblr](http://fandom-madnessess.tumblr.com/).


End file.
